Canada’s Freedom Convoy movement has officially gone global after vehicles streamed into the centre of Finland’s capital.
Helsinki saw dozens of motor vehicles clog its streets on Friday evening, sparked by the nation’s lockdown rules, as well as the rising cost of fuel in the country.
Police initially tried to stifle the protest before it occurred, implementing a ban on heavy goods vehicles — a class which includes a wide variety of trucks — without a permit from the city centre.
However, according to a report from Finnish public broadcaster Yle Uutiset, this did not stop the protest from going ahead, with dozens of vehicles, including motor homes, cars, vans, and at least one mobile sauna, streaming into the city centre for the demonstration.
Videos of the event shared on social media also showed anti-lockdown protesters demonstrating on foot, waving Finnish flags and cheering while the sound of drums can be heard in the background.
While initially warning that disruptions for the event could last up to six days, Yle Uutiset has claimed that the Finnish police broke up the protest, detaining around 55 people and towing a number of vehicles.
The broadcaster also reports, however, that the Freedom Convoy succeeded in blocking the Mannerheimintie — an important street that leads into Finland’s capital — for a number of hours.
Finland’s protest on Friday was not the first time the Freedom Convoy hit Europe.
Truckers — as well as a wide variety of other motorists — gathered in the Netherlands last week to protest their nation’s COVID lockdown rules.
Dozens of vehicles formed a convoy in the Dutch city of Leeuwarden, with motorists calling for an end to lockdown measures aimed at curbing the Chinese Coronavirus.
“I’m going to ride as long as I can, because I’m tired of all the measures,” one anti-lockdown protester is reported to have said. “Freedom, that’s what it’s all about, freedom!”
Meanwhile, back in Canada where the Freedom Convoy movement started, thousands of people have once again taken to the Ottowa Streets to protest vaccine mandates in Trudeau’s federal state, despite temperatures of around -20 Celsius, or about -4ºF.
However, further steps have been taken against the rallying truckers, with far-left crowdfunding platform GoFundMe announcing that it is going to “redirect” donations intended to support the movement to “verified” charities that are not necessarily related to the protests.
The left-wing platform reportedly made the decision over alleged “police reports of violence and other unlawful activity” regarding the ongoing demonstrations.
Such reports have not always resulted in similar actions from the platform, however, with the company previously allowing users to solicit donations for violent BLM-supporting felons who assaulted law enforcement officers.